Saturday, April 21, 2012

PCRT 3 - "The Gospel Power of God"

Sinclair Ferguson...

Romans 1:16-17:

For I am not ashamed of
the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes,
to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is
revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by
faith.”

The
Christian community at Rome lived at the epicenter of world power. If you were
to ask the residents of Rome to define “power” they may well have answered with
one word: Rome. In comparison to Rome, these small Roman house churches would
have been the very embodiment of weakness. But not only for the smallness of
their size, the church in Rome was weak internally as well. There were
fractures in their unity and love for one another. There were tensions between
Jewish and Gentile Christians. They were almost certainly fearful of the powerful
empire under whose heavy hand they lived. And how does Paul seek to address
their weakness, fears, and flaws? He points them to the powerful gospel.

From
what does the gospel save us?

1. The gospel saves us from
the wrath of God.
Outside of Christ, our chief problem is the wrath of God (Eph 2).

What
do I do when my conscience condemns me? It is in those times that we must
remember that God is greater than our hearts.

We
must not forget that Jesus has taken upon himself the wrath of the Father. “No
condemnation now I dread.” Do we live as a people who are deeply aware of the
fact that the Father has delivered us from his wrath? This is the magnificence
of the work of Christ.

God’s
gospel saves us from God’s own wrath, through God’s own Son, for God’s own
glory.

2. The gospel saves us
from our sin.

Our
sin goes down, down, down. But where sin abounded grace has abounded all the
more. There is more grace in Jesus Christ than there is sin in me. However deep
my sin goes, God’s grace goes down deeper.

We
may well be satisfied with a message that there is enough grace to match our
sin. But God is much more gracious than we imagine him to be. God does not give
enough grace to match our sins. He gives grace that is greater than our sin.

In
Romans 6 Paul writes that we have come to be united to a Christ who died to the
dominion of sin. He bore the guilt of sin and entered into that world where sin
expressed its dominion in his death. But Jesus was raised. And, as we learn in
Romans 4, in His resurrection in our justification for in Christ we are set free
from the dominion of sin.

In
Christ we have been transferred from the dominion of darkness into the kingdom
of light. Sin is surely present and will be till the day we see our Lord. But
even now sin’s reign over us has been broken.

Years
after his conversion, Augustine was approached on the street by his former
paramour who, recognizing her former lover said, “Augustine it is I.” To which
Augustine said, “Yes I see. But it is no longer I.”

In
Christ we are no longer what we were. We are now in Christ, not in sin.

This
is not to say that the Christian no longer sins. We know better than that. The
Christian must still fight to be sure. Just as there was much fighting in
Europe between D-Day and V-Day so there is much fighting with sin until we are
finally delivered from this fallen world.

Satan
knows his end. He knows he cannot destroy a Christian or snatch him from the
Father’s saving grace. So satan fights to make the Christian miserable.

Romans 8:31-35:

What
then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He
who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also
with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's
elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who
died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed
is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall
tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger,
or sword?

Who
is the “who” of Romans 8? Without mentioning his name, Paul accurately
describes the tactics of satan. It is Satan who threatens and condemns and
frightens.

So
how do we know that God is for us when satan does his worst against us?

We
know, says Paul, because the for our salvation, the Father did not spare his
own beloved Son. So if the Father has given us his best, most precious
treasure, what then will he withhold from us?

If
God has given his own son for us then we can be sure that he will stop at
nothing to bring us all the way home.